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How Frog Hospital got its name

News and commentary by Fred Owens in LaConner, a small town in the Skagit Valley. The story behind the name: There was once a grocery store in a quonset hut, run by Mr. Grobschmidt. Clyde, an old drunk who lived out on the river, thought that Mr. Grobschmidt looked like a frog, so he took to calling the store the "Frog Hospital." Now the quonset hut, Mr. Grobschmidt, and Clyde are all gone -- only this blog survives to carry on the Frog Hospital tradition.

Monday, November 26, 2018

It's possible to become an American, but it's never been easy. Newcomers
were given the worst jobs and lived in the worst neighborhoods. They
were mocked and abused and worse, People said they looked funny and they
couldn't speak English and their food smelled awful. People said much
worse than that, but over a period of time, we got used to them, and
they became like us, and we became a little like them. But it was always
difficult.....It was never easy.

There is
a trouble at the San Ysidro crossing between San Diego and Tijuana. We
can let the migrants in or we can turn them back. We can grant them
asylum or we can put them on a plane back to Honduras. I'm not proposing
a solution, but I do want to pose a context. Immigration has never been
easy. There was no golden age when newcomers were welcomed with
blessings and open arms. It was always tough. The Yankee kids beat up
the Irish kids until the Irish kids became cops and then the Irish kids
beat up the Jewish kids, and so it went. The Chinese were treated worse,
and the African slaves worst of all. But it was the promise of a better
life that made it happen -- those long, harrowing journeys and those
hopes.

And we can do better. We can get better
at welcoming strangers to join our culture. They can become like us and
we can become a little like them. It just takes time. It starts out
rough and then it gets smoother.

But one
thing is sure. The trouble at the border is a difficult situation and
Trump will make it worse. He will take a problem and turn it into a
crisis. He will take a crisis and turn it into a war. There must be a
way for calmer people to act and prevent a crisis and a war.

Thanksgiving and Driving Through Malibu

We
had a swell Thanksgiving with Laurie's family in Manhattan Beach. I sat
in the TV room and watched football games with Sam. Sam is Laurie's
brother's wife's brother. Got that? Sam was born in Japan and came to
California as a child. He is eighty years old

I would
guess and he pretends he doesn't speak English. The first six years with
Sam we watched the game together in silence, in full appreciation of
the calm atmosphere while the other relatives screamed with joy and
laughter in the living room.

But this year Sam
and I began to talk. He offered me a beer, and went to fetch it. He
offered me some edamame beans which he had cooked himself. His English
vocabulary is very limited but good enough, and his smile is genuine, so
we are friends now. Actually we were always friends even during the
silent years, enjoying a mutual love for Beer and Football.

(Regarding the football game -- I did actually rise to do a few kitchen chores, cleared dirty plates, took out the trash, etc.)

On Friday after Thanksgiving we visited my
sister and my son and two of my nieces in Venice Beach. We walked to a
restaurant and had brunch.

Then we drove up the coast through
Malibu. The Malibu fire is out, but the blackened hill sides come right
down to the highway and go on for ten miles and more. It will grow back
if it ever rains. The homes destroyed and the lives lost -- I'm glad we
saw it. We got back to Santa Barbara by dinner time and ate leftover
turkey and pumpkin pie.

Sunday, November 18, 2018

I
was getting kind of discouraged and feeling like a patsy. The last
straw was one I bought two sticky buns at Gelson's and they overcharged
me. I didn't object. I was too embarrassed. Why was I being so meek? Why
did I not say something and insist on the fair price?

I
decided to hold a pep rally. Go Fred Me. ...... It's like GoFundMe but
much cooler, and it doesn't cost any money. It's more of a vibrational,
psychological boost. Go get 'em, Tiger......

I want to be a hero like Gary Cooper in High Noon.
He ended up facing the desperadoes all by himself, but first he asked
for help. That's a hero to me. You ask for help. And if you get help,
good. If you don't get help and you're sure you're right, then you face
the desperadoes alone. That's me -- like Gary Cooper. That makes Laurie
like Grace Kelly -- don't you think?.

In
California we're asking for help from the federal government to help us
rebuild fire-torn communities. But let's be clear. That's our money. We
have paid many billions in taxes to the feds for just this reason --
disaster relief. So now we are asking for the money. as a courtesy.
Truly it's our money and we need it back now.

In Praise of Nancy Pelosi. The
really cool thing about Nancy Pelosi is that she sets the Republicans
an edge. In the last issue of Frog Hospital I only mentioned her name.
For doing that I got some unusually nasty mail from people who ought to
know better. Are they afraid of her? Good. So better show her some
respect.

There are those among the Democrats
who wish to replace Pelosi with someone younger and more progressive.
That will happen in time, but not yet, not yet. This year, this session
of Congress is Nancy's time. This is her moment, high heels and all.
She's going to go out a winner.

Trump is showing his Age. Trump
skipped ceremonial duties in Paris because of the rain, and he did not
lay a wreath on Veterans Day. I suspect he is just getting old and
tired. He's 72 and it's starting to show. Hey, Mr. Strongman, better get
some rest because you ain't what you used to be.

Trump has no Friends. A
lot of old guys his age, they get up early, 6 or so, and they go to the
local cafe and have coffee with other old guys and talk about how
things aren't what they used to be. Trump ought to do that. Go out in
the early morning and have coffee with his friends. If he had any
friends.

Bruce Byers gets KIdney Dialysis. Bruce
Byers is a man my age and a friend from the Santa Barbara Kiwanis Club
where we go to have lunch on Wednesday. Bruce's kidneys -- he has two --
have gone the distance, but they are per-squat now, at less than ten
percent of function, so he needs the dialysis. He goes three times a
week, Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, for three hours each time. Bruce
occupies a comfortable recliner next to the machine. The nurse hooks the
tubes up to the port in his chest, one going with blood to be rinsed
out, the other with cleaner blood to be returned. It is a miracle of
progress that we can do that and keep living. I visited him at the
dialysis center on Thursday. He seemed fairly cheerful considering. For
his three hour stint he has a smart phone and a laptop. On the laptop he
was watching Japanese animie cartoons.

"I
watch them to keep up on my Japanese. I lived in Japan for two years
and became somewhat conversant." Now, just what Bruce was doing in
Japan for two years I do not know. I could have asked. He is on two
waiting lists for a kidney transplant. The transplant is the only way
Bruce ever gets off the dialysis machine. But his overall health seems
good and I liked his smile. More about Bruce next time.

Monday, November 12, 2018

Today
is Election Day and you are probably glued to the tube or out
canvassing for your candidate. Good..... but life goes on, so while we
wait for results let me tell you about our recent trip to Hawaii, to the
Big Island.

We stayed five days in Kona on the
fourth floor of a condo with a balcony overlooking the sunset and the
pounding surf. The air was warm and humid. Let me say something right
off about humidity. I like it. Dry air is just air. Humid air is like a
warm pillow, you just move slowly and the clouds are comfy.

We
went snorkeling and saw golden fish. Snorkeling is light exercise, at
least for me. I'm a floater -- why paddle after fish? why not let them
come to you? I saw a sea turtle moving slowly along side me, unconcerned
and friendly, about 2 or 3 feet across on the hard back shell. The sea
was calm and gently swelling.

We took the
helicopter ride over the volcano. It's really big. The pilot played
dramatic volcanic music on the headphones, right out of Lord of the
Rings. Plumes of smoke rose over plunging craters and roads destroyed by
recent irruptions. Then she, the pilot, flew us to the waterfalls and
she played Elvis Presley singing Blue Hawaii as we drifted over
cascading ribbons of rain water. It was quite special, so calm we
floated above the green valley.

It was delightful. We walked through Botanic Gardens and ate Poke, delicious.

That's all, but after ten days on the island you begin to get Hawaiianized and it stays with you.

"California
is Burning," I wrote that a few months ago when the huge Ranch fire
swept through the northern part of the state. Now it's happening again.
People are exhausted and despondent. I mean people like me in Santa
Barbara and all we got is a little smoky air and a TV news show of
helicopters red-bombing the flames. Let alone the tens of thousands who
had to evacuate, let alone the thousands who have lost their homes and
the many who have died in the fire. It has been quite awful and if I
look out the window I see a tinder-dry landscape. There has been no rain
for months.

We expect the rainy season to
begin in late October, but so far we have had only one sprinkle and the
blues skies that make us famous now make us worried. Clouds feel
better. Hoping for clouds.

Some people
have a better attitude than me. I have lost nothing, but I am bummed out
to even be near this. Neil Young lost his home in Malibu or was it in
Topanga Canyon? Or was it Bob Dylan? Either way, famous people who have
pets and memories just like the rest of us have lost everything.

We
can build new homes in California. We have the resources to replace the
6,000 homes lost in Paradise. We can build 60,000 homes. We can make a
new city. What else can we do?

There is no replacing the lost oak trees, not in a hundred years, but still we will plant them.

The next issue of Frog Hospital. The
next issue of Frog Hospital will include political talk, fundraising
plans and medical concerns. A friend of mine is undergoing kidney
dialysis and he is in line for a new kidney. Talking with him about this
has been interesting. And, if he agrees, I will tell his story.

For
politics, I have in mind something like "In Praise of Nancy Pelosi."
And for fundraising we will announce the Go Fred Me fundraiser which
will commence in mid-January.